Households Warned Of £500-A-Week Benefits Cap

The Government is sending out letters to households affected by the £500-a-week benefits cap which comes in next April.  The cap will limit the amount of benefit couples and lone parent households can receive to around £500 a week or £26,000 a year – the equivalent of the average household income after tax or a gross household salary of £35,000.  Research published by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has put the number of claimants who would see benefit cuts as a result of the cap at 67,000 - 44% of which are in the social sector. More than half those affected are in London.  In January nine of the UK’s biggest housing associations in the South East warned the Government that the £500 a week benefits cap could see them pull out of building family-sized homes. This is because the cap makes the properties unaffordable under the Government’s Affordable Rent product, which allows providers to increase social rents to up to 80 percent of the market rate in order to fund new homes.  Read more on 24dash.